Cutting Tools

Any craft knife (like the X-acto knife) with detachable blades is great to use with polymer clay. The different types of blades are useful for different applications with polymer clay, and replacement blades are available, if you discover that you have a favorite.

Non-serrated kitchen knives can also be used, but often they are more knife than the job requires and more costly than inexpensive hobby knives--  especially considering that once a tool is used with clay, it shouldn't be used again for food preparation. If you decide to use a kitchen knife, be sure that it's a cheap one and mark it so that you won't forget that it's "clay-dedicated".

True tissue blades are used in the medical field for taking paper-thin samples of tissues. Clayers use ultra-thin, very sharp blades to take the thinnest possible slices from canes and mokume gane slabs. For the best results, use only the very sharpest blades for slicing canes and mokume gane. These blades come in different lengths and hardnesses. Some are very sturdy and don't tend to bend, while the extreme flexibility of others allow for curved cuts (such as the Buesseler cut that makes football-shaped beads from rectangular pieces of clay).

A wavy blade (or ripple blade) is sharp like a regular tissue blade, but because it is corrugated, it produces a different effect than a straight blade would. Use it to make unusually patterned slices from canes and loaves.

 

 

 

This kitchen tool (a flat square of metal with a slightly sharpened blade on one side and a handle on the other) can be used to slice pieces from large blocks of clay, to cut straight lines in sheets of clay, and to lift thin pieces of clay from the work surface. Potter's ribs (scrapers) can also be used for these purposes, as can wallpaper scraper blades.

Cheese slicers may be useful for taking thin slices from mokume gane slabs or for projects with mica shift. Slicers with a roughly triangular metal plane and a sharpened slot work better than the type with a taut wire. The wire slicers are meant for softer cheeses, and slabs of polymer clay aren't that easy to slice.

 

Like cheese slicers, y-shaped vegetable peelers can be useful for taking thin slices from slabs of mokume gane or mica shift. The y-shaped peeler is much easier to use for this purpose than other types of peelers.

 

Any sharp scissors can be used to cut through thin sheets of clay.

There are all types of decorative-edge scissors on the market today, thanks to the popularity of scrapbooking and other paper crafts. These scissors can also be used to cut fancy patterns in thin sheets of clay.

 

These work like pizza wheels or pasta wheels. In fact, you can use either kitchen tool with clay-just remember that they shouldn't touch food once they've been used with clay. Specialty rotary cutters designed for use with crafts are also available today. Different wheels produce different types of cuts, such as straight, wavy, or zig-zag.

Made for carving linoleum blocks for block printing, linoleum cutters are useful tools for carving in the surface of cured or partially-cured polymer clay. There are a variety of types of linoleum cutters, including different sizes of V-shaped and U-shaped gouges. Some sets come with a single handle and a set of interchangeable cutters. Gouges are also sold individually, either mounted in a handle or without handles. Many people prefer to make their own handles out of polymer clay. This allows you to switch between cutters quickly and easily, and some people find that polymer clay handles are more comfortable to use, since they can be made to conform to your own hand's shape.

Tools for carving wood, wire loop sculpting tools, and dental tools can all be used to carve clay. Objects found around the house can also be useful-just be careful not to use something for food preparation or serving once it has come into contact with polymer clay.